The Hindu : Front Page : ‘Pakistan dilly-dallying on Masood Azhar’

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Monday, Dec 22, 2008
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‘Pakistan dilly-dallying on Masood Azhar’

Special Correspondent

It has created an optical illusion of complying with UNSC directive: India

Masood Azhar

NEW DELHI: India cannot understand why Pakistan is frequently changing its stand on taking action against Jaish-e-Mohammad chief Masood Azhar despite overwhelming evidence of him having recruited and mentored youth to take to violence.

“Pakistan’s claims are factually incorrect. It has created an optical illusion of complying with the United Nations Security Council directive,” said authoritative sources while providing instances of the number of times Pakistani leaders and officials have spoken in different voices on the issue of arresting and prosecuting Masood Azhar.

Arrested in India on a false passport, Masood Azhar was among the militants exchanged for passengers of an Indian Airlines flight that was hijacked to Kandahar, Afghanistan. Transported by a triumphant cavalcade to Pakistan and helped by liberal funding, Masood Azhar’s modest house in Bahawalpur was transformed into a fortress where up to 700 men lived and freely practised firing. “All of this has appeared in the Pakistani media and none in Islamabad has denied any of this,” pointed out the sources.

“The capacity of the terrorists to perpetuate violence has to be neutralised. This was never done by Pakistan and the framework still remains in place,” they asserted, while reminding that Islamabad is yet to answer or act on the post-Mumbai attacks demarche to Pakistan asking for the perpetrators to be brought to justice.

Far from that, the chronology of developments in Pakistan relating to Masood Azhar appear to indicate that various forces are at work in Islambad’s corridor of power.

The sources pointed out that after the media said Masood Azhar was detained at his home in Bahawalpur, local police chief Azhar Hameed Khokhar denied the reports. Overruling him a few hours later was Defence Minister Chaudhry Ahmed Mukhtar. He told a TV channel that Azhar had been detained and Pakistan “might allow” Indian investigators to question him. But a day later, Prime Minister Syed Yousuf Raza Gilani told newspersons, “we are awaiting the latest reports about Maulana Masood Azhar; the other two are being investigated. He did not confirm or deny Masood Azhar’s detention.

A week later, Pakistan High Commissioner to India Shahid Malik denied that the government had detained Masood Azhar. He also claimed that Masood Azhar was not in Pakistan.

But the same day, Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi told the Dawn TV channel, “yes, in custody” when asked whether Masood Azhar had been arrested. An hour later, Mr. Qureshi was to remark in another interview: “Maulana Masood Azhar is wanted by the government of Pakistan but he is not in our custody and he is at large.”

A day later (last Thursday), a statement by the Pakistan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs seemed to give the impression that “no one is in control there,” the sources pointed out.

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